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12.05.2012

Russian photographer Andrew Osokin captures some wonderful ice formations at a truly nano scale. The awe inspiring combination of fractal geometry and the curious interchange of symmetry and asymmetry. Its a chicken or the egg causality dilemma that leaves one humbled by the capacity of the universe to dictate that ficklest of all perception peccadilloes: Beauty. And if you needed more evidence that we are all infinitely tiny, check out even more big images of tiny things, check out Osokin's LensArt profile. (via the curious brain).

The HGO is a water storage system that makes use of spaces that are largely overlooked: underneath floors, inside walls, and along narrow alleys. She solved the problem of how to make flat-walled steel tanks fit in those spaces without bulging with the weight of their water by placing a hole in the middle of the container. In this way, the hole’s circular walls act as an inside-out brace (see below).It helped that Dominguez had some prior product development experience, and knew that the manufacturing method known as “rotomolding” (rotational molding) worked well for creating hollow plastics — and might apply equally as well to creating modules that could stand on any of their sides and join conveniently to the next one. Using this method, she created a highly scalable water storage system that can easily link one module to the next while allowing water to flow through them without impediment. (1)The first Rainwater HOG tank debuted in Australia back in 2005, at a time when rainwater was still considered gray water (i.e., used household water). Thus the name: H2O Grey, or H2OG, or HOG. Now a version of the tank manufactured in the U.S. is available to the U.S. market, where the system has gained widespread popularity among green builders and architects in recent years. (1)We thought this was interesting in its potential application in places like Philadelphia and other large cites on the East Coast that are struggling to meet the EPA requirements for combined water/sewer outflows (CSO). Obviously there would need to be a way to completely drain and bypass these during the winter months, but it is nothing that a little engineering can't handle. Like many complicated urban problems, these tanks are far from a complete solution, but represent a step in the right direction.